Chinese cryptocurrency exchange Huobi confirmed the opening of its London office June 28, with over-the-counter (OTC) trading tests set to begin in Q3 this year. In a press release shared with Cointelegraph, Huobi, which claims to have a global user base of “more that five million,” continued its recent narrative that expansion into Europe was a priority, with London a deliberate choice for basing its new operations. “London was selected as the first office in Europe, due to its preeminence as a global financial center and the largest cryptocurrency trading centre in the region with an active blockchain community and …

Eight major European financial entities have announced they will work together on a blockchain tech project for recording the issuance of financial warrants, Spanish news outlet el Economista reports today, June 25. Spanish securities regulator the National Securities Market Commission (CNMV), along with major stock market operator BME, and banks Santander, BBVA, BNP Paribas, CaixaBank, Commerzbank and Société Générale have “successfully” completed a Proof-of-Concept, which they call Fast Track Listing. The system was created to register the issuance of warrants in under 48 hours, a process that usually takes more than a week, according to their statement also released today. …

The Swiss city of Zug will conduct a blockchain-powered trial municipal vote this summer, local media outlet Swissinfo.ch reported June 8. The event, which is scheduled to take place between June 25 and July 1, will reportedly be Switzerland’s first municipal vote using blockchain. According to the report, the upcoming trial vote will implement the city’s digital ID (eID) system that was launched in November 2017. The system will allow citizens to vote via their mobile devices. Apart from voting on minor municipal matters, citizens will also be asked if blockchain-based eID system should be used for referendum votes in …

Estonia rolled back its plan to establish a national cryptocurrency Estcoin following criticism from the President of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi, and local banking authorities, Bloomberg reported June 1. The managing director of the Estonian e-residency program, Kaspar Korjus, proposed the development and issuance of Estcoin in August last year. Along with becoming Estonia’s national virtual currency, Estcoin would ostensibly evolve into the official currency for the country’s e-residency program. In the program Estcoin would serve as an incentive for foreigners who use Estonia’s electronic identification to remotely sign documents and found companies. Draghi said in September, “no …

Visa has said that their card payments are experiencing disruptions across Britain and Europe, the BBC reports today, June 1. Visa, which handles over 150 mln transactions a day, tweeted about the service disruption, noting that they will keep updating as they resolve the situation: We are currently experiencing a service disruption which is preventing some Visa transactions in Europe from being processed. We are investigating the cause and working as quickly as possible to resolve the situation. We will keep you updated. — Visa UK (@VisaUK) June 1, 2018 In comparison, the Bitcoin’s (BTC) decentralized network has been functional …

One of the largest financial supervisors in Europe met with the National Bank of Georgia (NBG) and other members of the finance sector to discuss cryptocurrency regulation, according to a post on the NBG’s site May 18. According to the post, a representative from Germany’s Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) met with members of the NBG, the international financial institutions (IFI), private sector, commercial banks, brokers, audit, and legal companies to increase awareness of crypto in the country. At the meeting, the participants had a chance to receive detailed information on the crypto industry from the leading financial supervisory authority …

Recently hacked Japanese crypto exchange Coincheck will end trading for four privacy-oriented cryptocurrencies, Monero (XMR), Zcash (ZEC), Dash (DASH), and Augur (REP), Cointelegraph Japan reported May 18. Following reports from back in March, the exchange has now officially confirmed the removal of the four anonymity-focused coins will come into effect June 18. According to Coincheck’s blog, the exchange will remove the four cryptocurrencies to comply with counter-terrorist financing (CFT) and anti-money laundering (AML) measures recently issued by Japan’s financial regulator, the Financial Services Agency (FSA). The FSA has been especially active in regulating domestic crypto exchanges, specifically around customer protection, …

Belarus considers the digitization of the economy a top priority and is developing a resolution promoting digital economy for a session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE PA), local news BelTA reports May 15. Speaking at the Eurasian Digital Forum, the Minister of Telecommunications and Informatization Sergey Popkov said that digital technology is considered as a top priority due to its ability to transform “the economy, public administration and social services.” Popkov further cited the recently adopted Decree on the Development of Digital Economy, that facilitates cryptocurrency-related activity. “The adopted Decree number …

European leaders seem to have finally come to a consensus that the innovative technology underlying crypto-assets “has the potential to improve efficiency and inclusiveness of the financial system and economy more broadly,” as emphasized at the G20 summit in Argentina in March 2018. However, when it comes to regulation, the lack of consensus among global leaders made it impossible to enact broad legislation. Various European representatives pushed for coordinated legislation to restrict cryptocurrencies during the G20 summit with no success. Instead, there was agreement to set a July 2018 deadline for regulatory proposals. The hang-up over regulation may be due …

In the past few years we’ve been witnessing the new massive waves of cryptocurrency adoption — you can now pay in Bitcoin for almost anything from coffee to real estate. But the ideas were always above money in community and there is still so much untapped potential from decentralized digital coins. A history of Saber — a Brazilian complementary currency project, developed in early 2000s to promote the educational system, is an important example of the social potential we tend to forget keeping up with the rates of exchange. Brief history of complementary currencies Complementary currencies (CCs), also known as …

One of the three major questions that the President of the European Central Bank will be answering via a series of videos on Feb. 12, 2018 is about cryptocurrencies and Blockchain. Mario Draghi will respond to the selected questions, whether Bitcoin offers a viable alternative to traditional currencies as well as comment on the ECB's view on its technology, provided they are submitted by Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2018. Europeans aged between 16 and 35 can also ask questions around three main topics: possibility of a new global economic crisis, cryptocurrencies and Blockchain, Europe’s economic recovery and youth unemployment The session …

As we approach the highly anticipated BlockShow Europe 2017, Cointelegraph has met with Charlie Shrem, one of the twenty big-name speakers of the event, to discuss the hottest Blockchain news. However, one eyewitness is better than two hear-so's, as they say, and therefore we’d recommend to grab your conference tickets already now before they get pricey and/or sold out. But for now, let’s do a recap of the Blockchain-related stories that have surprised us the most in the last few weeks. A very confusing story of one “Blockchain-inspired” consortium After $59 mln research R3 Consortium, which was originally designed to …